Quills

Quills (2000)

Timing: 2:4 (124 min)

7.131/10
620

7.542/10
18952

7.2/10
59000

All about film

Video 1

Photo 14

Actors and characters

Release date

2000-11-22

Country

Germany, United Kingdom, United States

Production

Fox Searchlight Pictures, Charenton Productions, Industry Entertainment, Walrus & Associates, Hollywood Partners

Genre

Drama

Budget

$13 500 000

Revenue

$17 989 227

Website

Director

Philip Kaufman

Actors

Geoffrey Rush, Kate Winslet, Joaquin Phoenix, Michael Caine, Billie Whitelaw, Patrick Malahide, Amelia Warner, Jane Menelaus, Stephen Moyer, Tony Pritchard
All actors and roles (10)

Scenario

Producer

Nick Wechsler, Julia Chasman, Peter Kaufman, Des McAnuff, Sandra Schulberg, Rudolf G. Wiesmeier

Operator

Rogier Stoffers

Composer

Stephen Warbeck

Artist

Gavin Fitch

Audition

Priscilla John, Donna Isaacson

Editing

Peter Boyle
All team (100)

• The text presented in the film as works by the Marquis de Sade was actually written by the screenwriter, Dag Wright.
• A committed vegetarian, Joaquin Phoenix refused to wear leather items during filming. Therefore, his shoes were made from artificial leather.
• Geoffrey Rush himself directed the play performed by the psychiatric hospital patients in the film.
• The actors who played the patients at Charenton all received detailed consultations from a professional psychiatrist regarding the precise diagnosis of their characters' mental disorders.
• The props department requested details about the Marquis de Sade's meals in order to determine the composition of the "ink" mixture in the final episode.
• Luton Hoo (Luton, Bedfordshire, England), a famous castle, stood in for Charanton.
• The melody that the Marquis de Sade hums throughout the film is that of the French children's song "In the Moonlight." Its second line becomes increasingly relevant to the character as the film progresses: "Give me a pen so I can write a word."
• During the performance staged by Charanton's patients, a mask identical to the one worn by Robert Merivel (Robert Downey Jr.) in the film "Restoration" (1995) lies backstage.
• The real Marquis de Sade was extremely obese in the later period of his life.
• The real Abbé de Coulmier was a hunchback, standing 4 feet (1.22 meters) tall.
• In fact, the Marquis de Sade's second wife, Marie-Constance Quesnet, lived with him in Charanton – she managed to obtain a room located next to her lover's cell. Their daughter lived there as well.
• The real Madeleine Le Clerk was only 13 years old during her 'prison romance' with the Marquis de Sade.
• The literal translation of the original title is 'Feathers'.
• At the beginning of the film, a wax head of Queen Marie Antoinette, provided by the London Madame Tussauds wax museum, can be noticed in a basket with severed aristocratic heads.
• All the lines from the original screenplay that were cut during the film's production nevertheless found their place in it – being written on the clothes, sheets, and walls of the Marquis de Sade's cell.
• Abbot Du Coulmier’s maniacal desire to silence the Marquis de Sade, the abbot’s punitive measures against the Marquis, including the cutting out of his tongue, and Du Coulmier’s love for Madeleine Le Clerc – all of this is purely fictional, as is the Marquis de Sade’s suicide.
• The props department requested details about food favored by the Marquis de Sade in such a way as to obtain the composition of the “ink” mixture in the final episode.
• Luton Hoo (Luton, Bedfordshire, England), a famous castle, stood in for "Sharanton".
• The melody that the Marquis de Sade hums throughout the film is that of the French children's song "Au clair de la lune." Its second line becomes increasingly relevant to the character as the film progresses: "Give me a pen to write a word."
• During the performance staged by the patients of Sharanton, a mask identical to the one worn by Robert Merivel (Robert Downey Jr.) in the film "Restoration" (1995) lies backstage.
• The real Madeleine LeClerc was only 13 years old during her "prison romance" with the Marquis de Sade.
• The original title translates to "Feathers."
• Filming took place in England from August 5 to October 29, 1999.